1. I spent most of the morning and just past noon writing today. It took me a while to sort out the bliss of Thursday as I wrote my blog post -- all that music and all those interviews on the Criterion Channel! I like to write to Jeff on Fridays to let him know what I experienced listening to his Thursday night Deadish show and I continued a correspondence with a friend from Whitworth and had a lot to say about the last 45 years since he and I last saw each other in person! For any of you who do any kind of writing on a daily basis, you must know that experience of spilling out sentences, looking up, and suddenly realizing 6-7 hours have gone by. I experienced that (again) today.
2. For various reasons, I needed to stay home when Debbie left on Monday to go to Eugene. I enjoy Debbie's trips by vicariously experiencing things she does. It gave me a jolt of joy when she texted me today that she'd gone to Monkey's Paw, a Springfield tiki bar, with TRK and Anne to hear Brook Adams and his surf band, El Borko ¡Surf!, play. Likewise, I imagined myself being with her at Oakshire Brewing this afternoon for a meet up with Walker and Ingrid. Debbie wants to do some substitute teaching during her visit. I was relieved that the passport card I express mailed her arrived, enabling her to get the paperwork completed for the school district and very happy to learn that she'll be back in a classroom on Monday working with children and earning a little walk around dough. I'm also happy to know she'll be making some living room music. And, of course, I enjoy knowing that she is making occasional stops at 16 Tons, both the cafe and the bottle shop/tap room.
3. I'm not spending all my time vicariously enjoying Debbie's visit in Eugene.
This evening, I once again entered the jam-packed world of movies and interviews available on the awesome Criterion Channel.
I was going to jump right into watching The Parallax View, but when I searched for the title using Criterion's search engine, along with The Parallax View collection, a Room with a View collection popped up. Suddenly I was transported back to Eugene and a pair of movie theaters that sat where Olive Garden is now out in the Valley River area. If I remember correctly, those twin cinemas screened mainstream movies as well as less popular movies that one might usually see at an art house. I don't know if it's true, but my memory tells me that I saw Room with a View at one of those cinemas -- and, whether I actually did or not, it is indisputable that I loved that movie.
Well, the Criterion Channel Room with a View collection contains an interview with director James Ivory, costume designer John Bright, and cinematographer Tony Pierce-Roberts. Listening to them talk about how they created Room with a View was fascinating, reawakened a dormant interest I once had in watching James Ivory/Ismail Merchant movies, and almost moved me to put The Parallax View aside and watched a sophisticated romantic comedy instead of a paranoid political thriller.
But, I resisted escaping into the shimmering world of Room with a View.
Instead I entered the dark creepy world of The Parallax View. I chose paranoia over privileged Edwardians sorting out feelings about love in Florence and the sun-splashed nearby countryside.
And here's what I experienced:
To me, The Parallax View is a political thriller that is not political. What does that mean? Well, this movie gives us no indication as to the party affiliation of the politicians who are assassinated and gives no indication as to what political views the assassins have.
We learn, as journalist Joseph Frady digs into the mysterious deaths of witnesses to the story's first assassination, that a faceless corporation, Parallax is behind the killings. Parallax recruits and hires assassins.
I won't give away any more of the plot.
What I will say is that this movie asserts that USA corporations like the fictional Parallax function as largely amoral and apolitical entities. We never know, in this movie, who hires out Parallax's assassin services only that Parallax carries out the wishes of its clients and puts the power of its wealth and influence into guaranteeing that truth about these killings will never be revealed by investigative commissions. Never will these investigations conclude that the assassinations were the result of a well-coordinated corporate effort. The investigations will always conclude that the killers were acting alone, unaffiliated with any other conspirators.
It's the commercial nature of the apolitical and amoral forces behind the killings in this movie that create the paranoia, along with Parallax's dark and omnipotent uses of surveillance. There's no right or safe side to be on. There is nowhere to hide. The money and power behind these killings don't care about political views, policy, privacy, or right and wrong. Parallax is solely concerned with satisfying clients while accruing and securing power and increasing its capital gains. Parallax will surveil and carry out plans to kill anyone for the right price.
The Parallax View, by the way, came out in 1974.
No comments:
Post a Comment